Edit: sorry for the clumsiness of this post. It goes from A to D, back to B and straight to Y. My train of thought really is fragmented. Better read slowly and let everything sink in before you proceed onwards to the next line.
Alright, let's skip to the next conclusion. If Japan wasn't the result of divine intervention, but merely a necessary byproduct of human existence... then what
does make life worthwhile?
If life equals NOTHING > birth > survival > suffering > death > NOTHING, then what exactly is it that keeps us reproducing?
In essence nothing, that's why the brain has given us 'game' to serve as distraction. Humour, sports, art, culture, microwaves, jobs, vacations, politics, wars... they are nothing else but distractions to keep us going. Part of them are given by nature (the ability to enjoy company or labour for example), and some is manmade (sports, politics, etc.).
Without God the question is: do the things I enjoy in this life (these hedonistic occupations) weigh up against the suffering that inevitably sets in and ends in (painful) death?
I think for a lot of people the balance would be negative.
Religion of course is the greatest game of all.
I dare say the main reason for the ban on suicide in the church (and society in general) is the fact that it mocks the game that we play and confronts us with the truth we all wish to avoid: that we will die, and that we will suffer.
People who commit suicide no longer wish to play. They leave the field and as such remind us that we are really only playing a game and nothing more. The only thing that keeps us going is the belief that the game we play holds any validity, or, more realistically, that suffering and death will come tomorrow and not today.
I can understand that people are disappointed when they find out there is no God (and thus, that suffering and death cannot be surpassed in any way), but does it really make you feel better to rob other people of the illusion?
God and everything metaphysical goes beyond what science can prove to be existent or non-existent. Thus the natural state is that of agnosticism. We are either religious or atheist because we were brought up as such, or because we chose to be.
I dare say most of our parents were religious and that we grew up with some sort of belief in God. Thus, we made the choice to become atheists ourselves. Since we can't back this up with any scientific evidence, there
has to be other reasons why we resent the notion of God.
So, now that we have established that God is really nothing more than a made-up creature and that thus our parents (and teachers) were wrong, and.. that indeed suffering and death is prone to this existence, what now?
Do we engulve ourselves in hedonistic pleasure and pretend like there's no tomorrow?
Would that not be the same thing as the God-people are essentially doing?
Or do we go emo-cut ourselves in the knowledge that nothing really matters anyway? That we're all on a train to nowhere?
I dunno, I say we cherish the games that make our lives enjoyable, even if we deep down know they hold no meaning and are just that, games.
So let's be nice and not crack down on other people's distractions.